Not A Conversation About Existentialism
by foodforever
Summary: Kate gets knocked out and finds herself on Platform Nine and Three Quarters, with Loki nowhere in sight. Outtake from a possible third story about Loki and Kate, set WAY after In Dreams. One-Shot.


**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the OC.**

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><p>Kate came to with the decidedly uncomfortable feeling that came with sleeping on a hard surface in a cramped space – in this case, she realised, swinging her feet around to the ground – a bench. Just a regular old bench, like the sort you'd find at a train station. Not exactly something you'd expect to find on Thanos' depressing asteroid of doom.<p>

_Thanos!_

With a jolt of panic, she shot to her feet, peering frantically around the misty, white space. Where the _fuck _was she?

Things began to take shape – red brick pillars, black wrought-iron strips supporting an arched ceiling, train tracks before her, and, finally and inexplicably, a platform number, sketched into a sign.

Incredulous, she walked over for a closer look. "I'm on fucking platform _nine and –three-quarters_?"

_What the flying fuck? _

"Well, you're not _really _on platform nine and-three-quarters. That's all just fiction. Seriously."

She whipped around, reaching for her telekinesis on instinct before realising that she couldn't access it. There was a sealed-up space in her mind where the reservoir of her powers used to be. That should have bothered her a great deal, but surprisingly, she wasn't too fussed. It looked like she wouldn't need them, anyways.

There was a girl lounging on the bench that she'd just vacated. She looked pretty non-threatening, and seemed ridiculously chirpy. "This _is_ all in your head, though, so I guess that's why your brain supplied us with this little setting. You really are _obsessed_ over Harry Potter. It's hilarious."

Thoroughly confused, Kate opened my mouth to say something, but couldn't find anything to say. She shut it again.

The girl patted the space beside her on the bench. "Don't worry, I'm not Dumbledore. I'm not going to go on about all that existential shit. And there isn't a Horcrux under the seats, so you might as well sit down."

"What the _fuck _is happening?" Kate finally managed to ask.

Exasperated, the girl thumped the space again. "Sit _down_."

And suddenly, she was on the chair, ass practically glued to the wood. The girl settled back, satisfied. "I know that you're in a little bit of a pickle right now, but you're not going to be getting answers if you're all demanding and rude."

Kate really wouldn't call it a pickle.

"Err. What's going on?"

The girl turned her dark, dark eyes on her. "You tell me. You're one of those immortal fuckers, so it's not like you're dropping by for actual business. Unless you've been slain, of course, but that usually comes off as pretty obvious. I get a memo when that happens."

"What?"

She sighed impatiently. "I'm Thanatos, you fool."

That bit of information should have been a shocker, but surprisingly, Kate wasn't too surprised. "Oh."

"Yeah. People usually expect me to do a lot more wailing or wear a little more black, but I think that black's depressing. I _adore_ pink. Don't you like pink?"

And that's when Kate realised that Thanatos, Death herself, was wearing a bright pink peplos. "I didn't think they made them in that colour," she said, more to herself than the other girl.

Thanatos shrugged. "It was the universe's one concession in having me do all its fancy discombobulating stuff. I mean, if I've got to break it to people that they're dead from the beginning of mortal life to the very end of it, I might as well do it in something that makes me happy."

It was hard to argue with that logic.

"I thought Thanatos was a guy."

The girl beside her shrugged and examined her nails. "You can't actually expect the mortals of ye olde Greece to get shit right _all _the time. And it's not like all the other mortals of ye olde ancient world were accurate, either. Might I remind you that they turned Loki into a mare and had him squeeze out a six-legged foal? That's clearly untrue." Thanatos paused. "Right?"

Kate snorted. Loki had expressly told her that that myth was an _outrageous _lie, but coming from the God of Lies himself, that really wasn't particularly reassuring. She decided to change the subject.

"So," Kate hesitated, scrutinising her, "do you _actually _look like this, or did I just cobble a manifestation of you together from forgotten bits of memory in my brain?"

Thanatos looked pretty offended. "Of course I look like this! I mean," she added hastily, "I look like this to _you_. If you were a porcupine, I'd be a porcupine. But still, I'd be my _own _porcupine. Does that make sense to you?"

"Err…"

"Ok. Um. Maybe I'll try it like this: when a mouse sees me, he sees another mouse – but I'd still be Thanatos the mouse. When a lion sees me, he'd see another lion – but then, I would be Thanatos the lion. I couldn't appear to a mouse as a lion, because that would probably scare the poor thing to another death, and I couldn't appear to a lion as a mouse, because then he'd probably die again of embarrassment. I'm the great equaliser, see? A lion is equal to other lions, just as a mouse is equal to other mice. You can't compare mice and lions. It's not proper."

That kind of made sense, too. "Ok. Got that."

Appeased, Thanatos sat back against the bench and began to braid her hair. "So, you still haven't told me how you got here. Since I'm pretty sure that this is just a social visit, I'm not really sure how much time you've got left."

All the memories came rushing back, and Kate winced. "Ugh. I'm probably here until Loki manages to reverse Thanos' ritual shit. Your boyfriend is a _nutcase._"

"Hey!" She squawked indignantly, abandoning her braid. "He's _not _my boyfriend. At least, he's not _now_. I'll have you know that _your husband_ used to be _quite _the nasty piece of work himself, back in the day."

Kate's eyes flashed. "As you said, _back in the day_."

Deflating, Thanatos recommenced braiding. "He wasn't always mad, you know," she said quietly, reflectively. "He used to be clever and funny and kind and an _absolute _sap."

Kate tried and failed to imagine Thanos, the Mad Titan, as an absolute sap.

Thanatos must have seen her expression, because she perked right up. "I know it's a bit of a stretch, but it's true. He used to be plain old Owen, back when we were larking about the new, green, nice-smelling universe."

"Owen…?" Kate echoed, feeling a little taken aback.

Thanatos nodded. "Coeus, he was – but I liked to call him Owen. We'd have _such _fun, just traipsing around and discovering new things and staying out of Cronus' way – now _that_ was a mad titan if I ever saw one…" she trailed off sadly. "Then the mortals started popping up, and _someone _had to guide them around into the great big _finish _that they go to when their work is done. He got a little cut up over me taking up the job, because he's immortal, see – and he'd never see me, so that kind of put the 'long' _and_ the 'distance' in _long distance_. I suppose that's when he lost the plot entirely."

Thanatos' shoulders drooped, and Kate suddenly felt overwhelmingly sorry for this lonely, bright, fiercely dutiful being.

"Crazy little thing called love, huh," she joked, trying to lighten the mood.

Death laughed, but it came out a little strangled. "Tell me about it."

There was a brief silence before Kate cleared her throat awkwardly. "I don't suppose you'll tell me how to get rid of him…?"

Thanatos pursed her lips thoughtfully. "He's a titan, so he's pretty much more immortal than you, if that makes sense. It's like that with all the other titans. All I know about the fall of the titans is from what I've heard from the dead – I was already here when the whole Titanomachy stuff went down. From what I've gathered, after they lost against the spawn of Cronus and Rhea, most of them literally unmade themselves to become part of the universe. For instance, Tethys and Oceanus became the oceans, and Theia discombobulated herself to form moonlight. She always _was_ a floaty little flake. Cronus… they said that he'd been imprisoned in Tartarus, but no one knows where that is, and I don't even know how they did it. He was a nut, but he was a tough one to crack."

"So a titan _can _be imprisoned?"

"Well, no one's heard from Cronus since Zeus had a thunderbolt to his balls, so yeah. I guess so."

Kate was so excited that she was _trembling_. She had to get this back to Loki. She had to get back and start researching. There was an end in sight to this madness; she just had to _find _it. "Thanks, Thanatos."

The girl smiled benignly. "I normally wouldn't condone the destruction of exes, but I think that Owen really has taken it a little too far. All this talk of sending me more people… He's sending me more _work_, that's what it is."

Kate laughed at Thanatos' indignation, but stopped abruptly when she suddenly felt herself lose feeling in her fingertips. Curious, she glanced down to see her body slowly turning translucent. Thanatos looked over, too, and she rose with a sigh. "I suppose your time here is up. I won't be seeing you on business for a long time, I hope… but if you ever find out how you managed to get here on a social visit pass, will you come back?"

Kate smiled as warmth travelled up through her spine. Without really thinking about it, she reached out and gave Thanatos, the embodiment of Death herself, a very tight hug. "I will. You're pretty cool."

Thanatos, who had not been hugged in literally an eternity, buried her head in Kate's shoulder. "I'm glad I have a friend who isn't dead."

Kate squeezed back, and then she was gone.

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><p><strong>AN: I wasn't intending on writing the sequel to _In Dreams_ anytime soon, but this plot bunny just hopped into my head and wouldn't leave. Let me know what you think, and whether you want a new story spun around this! **


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